ABOUT

Scratchy Sounds, Tour DJ with the Clash, Joe Strummer & The Mescaleros, The Pogues and Gogol Bordello, resident of London's Gypsy Hotel and Selectah at clubs and festivals across the globe from New York to Paris to Tokyo, spins sets of The Rock and The Roll of The World & Roots Rockin' Rhythms & Blues.

LATEST NEWS

APRIL 2020

LIVING IN LOCKDOWN Chapter One

Keeping the Scratchy Sounds spinning from a safe social distance.

The 20-20 LUCKY SEVEN JAPAN TOUR

Despite the difficulties, Scratchy was delighted to return to Japan for a seventh time this March and honour most of his commitments.

Scratchy deeply regrets he had to cancel the following final two shows and sends his apologies. This was unavoidably due to having to return to London prematurely, because of the global impact of the coronavirus and the rapidly changing situation in the UK. Hopefully another chance to play Drink 'Em All and Rumba Loco will present itself in the future:

FEBRUARY 2020

19-29

MAR

Lucky Seven Tour, Japan

Due to COVID-19 & until venues and gigs open up again, as with all DJs, Scratchy's live sessions have had to be cancelled for the forseeable future. Watch this space & facebook for updates. Whilst you have time on your hands, you can always check out the many Scratchy Sounds radio shows on mixcloud. Stay safe and well.

Scratchy will be out with his vinyl six-guns a-blazin' around London, this February. Kicking off on the first of the month, he'll be joining those celebrating Porky's Prime Cuts, records cut by the master mastering engineer, George Peckham, at The Three Compasses in Dalton. Scratchy returns to Brave Sir Robin on the seventh with his night, Diggin' The Roots. The following weekend, Saturday night he keeps the party going at Khalid Siddiqui's '50 Years Of Action' event at Paper Dress Vintage and the next afternoon lays down some 'Good Time Religion - Groovin On A Sunday Afternoon' once again at Brave Sir Robin and is back there again the following Sunday.

MUSEUM OF LONDON CALLING

Some artefacts from Scratchy’s personal archive are on display, as part of the the new exhibition at the Museum Of London, honouring The Clash and their album 'London Calling’, that was released 40 years ago. Scratchy has also contributed to the Scrapbook, the hard-back companion piece to the latest edition of that classic album. Both the exhibition and the book have been curated and designed by artist Robert Gordon McHarg III.

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Scratchy commented, “It’s good to know that there was actually some method in the madness of hoarding and saving these dust-collecting momentos, through all the moves and miles that have intervened over years that have passed. I’m delighted a few of them are being unearthed for this incredibly important celebration. The two years I spent as the band's tour DJ was a period of my life that I particularly cherish. It had a major impact on the road I have travelled down over the four decades since and, no doubt, will continue to do so, during whatever lies ahead.”

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Just as some of these kept items came in handy for the sleeve of the Scratchy Sounds compilation, released by Trojan in 2004, so, now, a few more get to see the light of day. And there’s still more to come.

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The exhibition openedon Friday November 15th 2019 and runs until April 19th 2020 at the Museum Of London.

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Entrance to the exhibition is free.

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Scratchy was on hand on the launch night, to conjure up a flavour of his Clash tour sets spinning some of his punk, reggae, ska, r&b and rock’n’roll records.

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The road keeps rolling on.

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The latest Scratchy Sounds for Radio Kaos Italy features a selection of the bands who opened up for the Clash, during the two-year period he joined them on the road and is now available on Mixcloud.

ROCKIN' THE FRONTLINE SINCE 1976

Scratchy’s illustrious career on the decks has taken him from Budapest’s Sziget Island Festival to L’Olympia in the heart of cosmopolitan Paris, from the lush valley of Fuji Rock to the cobbled square of carnival time Recife and from his beginnings in London’s rock’n’roll heartland at Dingwalls Dancehall to the beat of 14th Street at NYC’s famed Palladium alongside The Clash.

Resident DJ of Dingwalls Dancehall during 1976 & 1977, he first stamped his mark on the emerging punk scene, the night of July 5th 1976, spinning alongside The Ramones and The Flamin' Groovies, before moving on to play concerts at all the major venues in London: the Roundhouse, Lyceum, Electric Ballroom, Rainbow and Hammersmith’s Odeon & Palais. As a tour DJ, he was on the road with The Clash from 1978-80 and has been similarly associated with Joe Strummer and the Mescaleros, Dr. Feelgood, The Pogues, Gogol Bordello, Groundation, The Dead Brothers and The Urban Voodoo Machine.

Since the start of the new millenium, this incomparable selectah has been turning on the globalista magic for audiences in clubs, bars and festivals across the planet. From October 2006 onwards he has been the resident disc spinner at top London night, The Gypsy Hotel.

In December 2015, starting with a two-week return to Japan, he launched into the ’40 Years of Scratchy Sounds’ Jubilee, which continued throughout 2016, celebrating four decades since his first professional engagements at London’s Speakeasy in late 1975 and his subsequent first full-year on the decks, the momentous 1976. It was in those first months of his two-year Dingwalls residency, most notably at his first ever punk show with The Ramones, that Scratchy laid the foundations to his unique DJ style, that bears the same spirit to this very day.

Scratchy has been hailed as a Music Shaman. Whether on radio or in the flesh, Scratchy’s legendary and vibrant selections will delight, make you want to dance to some of the greatest music on the planet and take you places where others fear to tread.

SCRATCHY SOUNDS

Musical Shamanism:

The Rock and The Roll of The World,

Globalista Rhythms and The Universal Blues.

Scratchy is renown for his constantly shifting and never predictable, Rockin', Roma, Dubbed-Up, Mestizo mixes which take a voyage through the soundscapes of London to Louisiana, Kingston to Colombia, Bucharest to Bollywood.

Whilst he packs a broad and deep travelling collection of CDs for sets that cover all aspects of The Rock and The Roll of The World, whether in its entirety, or homing in on the different specialist areas contained within, Scratchy also spins off vinyl for nights of Roots Rockin’ Rhythms & Blues, the music that lies at the very heart of all those Scratchy Sounds.